I am playing along with Darwin.
Waterside books:
- The Aubrey-Maturin books. So much fun -- I especially love the relationship between the two principals.
- The Midwife: A Memoir of Birth, Joy, and Hard Times. I bought this based on a lukewarm recommendation, and so I was surprised to enjoy it as much as I did. I've been re-reading bits of it, which is unusual for me. A skeptical nurse comes to live with nuns for midwifery training, providing care to working-class women in London's East End.
- The Dirty Life or The Quarter-Acre Farm or The Seasons on Henry's Farm. That's kind of a cheaterpants thing to do, sneaking in three books when I was asked for one, but I'm doing it anyway. I suppose since I kicked off this section of the meme by recommending 19 books instead of 1, I'm obviously not displaying a firm commitment to following the rules. Last summer while Elwood was away and Stella was sleeping like a wombat on Dexedrine, I was on a farming tear with my late-night reading. My own garden was sadly neglected during this stage, but I sure did read a lot about growing vegetables. I can't decide which of these I liked best; the third is the slowest-moving of the three but worthwhile anyway.
Watershed books:
- War and Peace. I'd always thought this book must be the slowest, dullest work ever written -- somber and pretentious and interminable. But then I read it. I laughed out loud at the opera scene. I was blown away by Tolstoy's perspicacity -- his ability to write a scene that rang absolutely true, revealing something I recognized but could not have articulated. I read it at 19, and it was my introduction to the truth that Great Books are great not because they are suffocating but because they seem to breathe.
- Bleak House. I read this one in the winter of 2003, when we were living in Rockland County, NY and I hated everything about it. ("It" being Rockland County, not Bleak House. I'm glad to have met my friend Gina that year, but otherwise it was pretty dismal.) Bleak House was a kick in the pants, reminding me that you can live your life wishing for the future or blooming where you're planted.
- King Lear. I have posted before about reading Lear, the play that kicked off my Shakespeare project. There's another story behind that choice, but there is also a wombat-ish call issuing from upstairs and so I am going to settle my daughter. Perhaps I'll tell it tomorrow. Oh UGH I am thinking now that this is too pretentious to post but I'll hit publish anyway. Draft posts only rarely make it out of the drafts folder.
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